Politics and polls

Published: Friday, February 1, 2013 at 08:00 AM.

Like generals fighting the last war, Florida political officials are still squabbling over the previous election.

At the Associated Press’ annual legislative planning meeting Wednesday in Tallahassee, Democratic and Republican leaders pointed fingers and traded accusations over who was to blame for the voting foul-ups last November in several areas of the state. Naturally, the focus was on the 2011 law that among other things reduced the number of early voting days.

“We need to admit that that was a partisan action in 2011 that Republicans did to try to game the system so Republicans could get more votes and Democrats could get less,” Democratic Party executive director Scott Arcenaux said during a panel discussion on the 2012 election.

What’s important is to make changes necessary to ensure the problems don’t repeat, not scoring partisan political points.

Many of the provisions of the 2011 law seemed unnecessary and ill-advised at the time, and the 2012 election only cemented that belief. Republicans at the time argued that reforms were needed to combat voter fraud, even though there was scant evidence such fraud was occurring. At Wednesday’s panel, GOP leaders didn’t even mention voter fraud.

Maybe that’s because they were too busy fending off Democratic charges that the real aim of the 2011 law was to suppress minority voter turnout that overwhelmingly benefits Democrats. One example of racial bias Democrats pointed to was eliminating early voting on the Sunday before Election Day, which in 2008 had been the day many African-American voters had cast their ballots after attending church (a get-out-the-vote effort dubbed “Souls to the Polls”).

If Republicans were trying to rig the system, they failed spectacularly. Not only did President Obama win Florida’s electoral votes, but the GOP lost seats in the state House and Senate. And they made lots of voters, in both parties, angry with the delays.

Like generals fighting the last war, Florida political officials are still squabbling over the previous election.

At the Associated Press’ annual legislative planning meeting Wednesday in Tallahassee, Democratic and Republican leaders pointed fingers and traded accusations over who was to blame for the voting foul-ups last November in several areas of the state. Naturally, the focus was on the 2011 law that among other things reduced the number of early voting days.

“We need to admit that that was a partisan action in 2011 that Republicans did to try to game the system so Republicans could get more votes and Democrats could get less,” Democratic Party executive director Scott Arcenaux said during a panel discussion on the 2012 election.

What’s important is to make changes necessary to ensure the problems don’t repeat, not scoring partisan political points.

Many of the provisions of the 2011 law seemed unnecessary and ill-advised at the time, and the 2012 election only cemented that belief. Republicans at the time argued that reforms were needed to combat voter fraud, even though there was scant evidence such fraud was occurring. At Wednesday’s panel, GOP leaders didn’t even mention voter fraud.

Maybe that’s because they were too busy fending off Democratic charges that the real aim of the 2011 law was to suppress minority voter turnout that overwhelmingly benefits Democrats. One example of racial bias Democrats pointed to was eliminating early voting on the Sunday before Election Day, which in 2008 had been the day many African-American voters had cast their ballots after attending church (a get-out-the-vote effort dubbed “Souls to the Polls”).

If Republicans were trying to rig the system, they failed spectacularly. Not only did President Obama win Florida’s electoral votes, but the GOP lost seats in the state House and Senate. And they made lots of voters, in both parties, angry with the delays.

Reducing the number of early voting days from 14 to eight also has been partially blamed for the long lines at polling places in Central and South Florida. Gov. Rick Scott and Republican lawmakers appear amenable to increasing the number of early voting days, and legislation has been filed to address another reason for voting delays — an inordinate amount of constitutional amendments (all proposed by the Legislature) that clogged ballots.

Tallahassee needs to work with local election officials to fix what’s broken — and to leave alone what isn’t. Senate President Don Gaetz has suggested giving counties more power to tailor certain election laws to their communities’ needs. That jibes with what Bay County Supervisor of Elections Mark Andersen has advocated. He has pointed out that Bay didn’t have near the problems that Miami-Dade, Orange and other counties did.

Some counties don’t need 15 days for early voting, he has said, and don’t want to have to pay for the expenses of being forced to accommodate that schedule.

If some counties need more days or more polling places or more voting equipment, then the state should allow it (and help fund it).

That’s a good forward-looking approach that learns from the past without clinging to it.